Verlin

March 25, 2019

Thanks!

Hi,

This will probably be an alarmingly fannish message, only the second I’ve ever written, but I stumbled onto your site and I can’t help myself.

Reading Alan Mendelsohn forty years ago changed my life. (Pardon the mysterious font change — my computer is prone to whimsy). I hope you’re not insulted that the compelling first thought I had upon closing your book was “hey, I can do this.” To be fair, the second thought was “This is my new favorite book.” The former has proven unrealistic, the latter remains the case.

I did become a writer, though, and I have you to blame.

As gratitude and/or revenge dictates, I’d like to send you my latest adult novel, which I think you’d enjoy. Let me know if you’re interested. I’m not mentioning my full name or the title to be clear that I’m not trying to use this forum to promote it.

Anyway, thanks again for the many hours of provocative fun.

Yours,

Verlin

Daniel replies:

Don't blame me. You would have become a writer in any event, and if it were not a book of mine someone else's book would have been the one that caused you to realize it was something you wanted to do. Notwithstanding, I am delighted it was a book of mine. If it means completing a gesture of some sort you can send me a copy of your book, understanding that I may never get around to reading it. There are instructions somewhere on this website for sending things. I too wrote a letter to the author of the book the reading of which occasioned my saying, "Hey, I too can do this." I should have asked if he'd had a similar experience and written a similar letter. There could be a lineage going back to some progenitor forgotten second-rate author from the early days of cheap printing.